ERBIL, Kurdistan Region -- In what’s being described as a “watershed moment” for Turkish politics, leaders of the country’s two largest parties have agreed to a new initiative regarding the ongoing armed conflict between the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and the Turkish state.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, leader of the opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), met yesterday in Ankara to discuss a proposal put forward by the CHP.
The 10-article package aims to engage the parliamentary process in finding a solution to the decades long standoff that has killed over 40,000 soldiers, militants and civilians since the PKK took up arms in the late 1970s. The initiative proposes to create a parliamentary cross-party Social Consensus Commission, assisted by a non-parliamentary committee of ‘Wise Men’, charged with finding substantive solutions to the problem.
Following yesterday’s hour-long meeting, Ömer Çelik, deputy leader of the AKP, said that his party had found the CHP’s proposals “positive,” but added that the “CHP now has to convince other opposition parties.” In that event, Çelik said, Prime Minister Erdoğan would back the establishment of the Social Consensus Commission.
The opposition Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), however, refused an invitation to participate in Wednesday’s meeting, with party leader Devlet Bahçeli describing the proposal as “treason.” The committee of ‘Wise Men’ was an idea put forward by imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan, he said following the AKP-CHP meeting, adding that “there’s no such thing as the Kurdish question.”
Deputy CHP leader Faruk Loğoğlu who co-authored the proposal said his party would nevertheless be seeking the support of both the MHP and the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP).
“Our main objective is to put an end to terror,” Erdoğan said at a trade convention before Wednesday’s meeting. “You may disagree with our proposals – then bring your own proposals and we will lend our support. There should not be hostility in politics or the labeling of your opponent as a traitor.”
Ahead of yesterday’s meeting, BDP parliamentarian Nazmi Gur praised the initiative, telling Rudaw it was a “positive step for democracy in Turkey.”
If any party refuses to sign on to the initiative, the AKP and CHP will set up an extra-parliamentary commission consisting only of members of those parties who agree to the package, the AKP’s Ömer Çelik told reporters in Ankara yesterday.
